Bruce Riedel

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MundoOriente Próximo,

To contain Iran, or to preempt? That is, at present, the question. President Obama’s recent dismissal of containment as an option would seem to stack the deck. Unless Iran pauses its uranium enrichment activities, an Israeli or U.S. strike against its nuclear facilities looks likely by next year.

Containment always looks better in theory, or in retrospect, than it works in practice. Our four-decade containment of the Soviet Union included several near misses, including the Berlin crisis and the Cuban missile crisis. And given the Iranian regime’s willingness to resort to terror tactics — even on U.S. soil — and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s purported remarks about wiping Israel off the map, there are clear downsides to relying on Iranian rationality that the regime can be deterred.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoOriente PróximoInternacionalTerrorismo Internacional, , ,

America needs a new policy for dealing with Pakistan. First, we must recognize that the two countries’ strategic interests are in conflict, not harmony, and will remain that way as long as Pakistan’s army controls Pakistan’s strategic policies. We must contain the Pakistani Army’s ambitions until real civilian rule returns and Pakistanis set a new direction for their foreign policy.

As Adm. Mike Mullen, then the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told a Senate committee last month, Pakistan provides critical sanctuary and support to the Afghan insurgency that we are trying to suppress. Taliban leaders meet under Pakistani protection even as we try to capture or kill them.…  Seguir leyendo »

InternacionalTerrorismo Internacional

Al Qaeda has just released the latest in its series of how-to guides for jihadists in the West who want to murder without the bother of flying to Pakistan to be trained. This time, the offering is an English-language manual explaining in detail how to build a bomb, and it demonstrates how nimbly Al Qaeda has adapted to become the world's first truly global terrorist organization, able to recruit and train fanatics on the Internet as well as on the ground.

Almost 10 years after the most devastating attack on the American homeland by a foreign power since the British army burned Washington in 1814, Al Qaeda remains alive and deadly.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoOriente PróximoInternacionalTerrorismo Internacional

Al-Qaeda sees a war between America and Iran as its fondest dream come true. For the terrorists who attacked America on 9/11 and have been waging war against our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan ever since, a war between the United States and Iran would be a tremendous strategic victory since two of their most deadly enemies would bleed each other. The Sunni Arab jihadist community would kill two birds with one stone.

In February, the new head of al-Qaeda in Iraq, the self proclaimed Amir of the Islamic State of Iraq, Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, issued a statement welcoming the surge of more American troops into Iraq and looking forward eagerly to an American nuclear attack on Iran.…  Seguir leyendo »